debts, death, and balance
by Landwerda
Summary: Bucky fights for his chance at revenge, while Tony battles his own demons. They might be broken and bleeding, but the world still needs its heroes, at the end of the day. An AU where IM3 happens after CWS. [Part 2 of To Dance With a Limp]


**Warning for slight torture, later in the chapter. Some bad words, too. The characters were naughty, not the author. So don't blame me.**

* * *

Bucky wakes up three days later, in a small shack in the middle of Kansas, Tony tucked into the couch two feet away and a small, smoldering pile of newspapers between them- a pathetic attempt to keep them warm.

It is not yet day, the light dark and soft, the corners of the world smoothened into darkness. There is peace, in this small niche of the world, even more than on an early-morning-beach; it is not a preternatural silence, because the wind howls, the trees creak, and everything is just plain _old,_ but rather a common sort of quiet, the quiet formed by the silence of nothing more to be said.

Except… there is everything to be said, between Tony and him, a distance needed to be bridged that neither wants to cross.

Reaching out, he grasps a flutter of paper in his left arm- the metal one- and reads the title, red and bold, slashing across the top like a knife.

 _(Like Howard's blood, like Steve's pleas, like Natalya's hair)_

It reads: **_Tony Stark Dead?_**

And Bucky feels something- something small, trusting, and innocent- break like a twig caught in an avalanche.

 _(Dead and gone, ashes to ashes and dust to dust, what man will stand at my grave, I who have a thousand deaths in my soul?)_

* * *

The door creaks open, footsteps on old wooden slats as Tony steps outside.

"Jesus," he hisses into the chilly air.

Bucky doesn't reply, keeps his distance, a grey shadow among a thousand other shadows, melting into the steadily lightening sky. Then he blows out a puff of smoke, watches the world fade, smudges fading against the cloud, into dullness.

"Any reason you're out here, when it's goddamn freezing and you should've been asleep- I mean I understand that you don't feel the cold like _normal_ people, I get it, I don't have any room to talk, but-"

"The world thinks you're dead," Bucky cuts him off, not angrily, because anger is not something he should feel- he can allow himself _to_ feel- but rather flatly, controlled, with an undertone of furious, blazing betrayal. " _Why?"_

There's a long moment of silence, and it isn't like Bucky's not unhappy- in fact, he respects that whatever Tony says next will likely be the unvarnished truth- but he's also impatient, and he shows it by exhaling a beat too quick.

"I told Pepper," he says finally. "And Happy. And Rhodey. But… nobody else."

"Nobody deserve it?" Bucky asks after a breath, acknowledging the silent apology, tilting his head sardonically.

Tony snorts, leans forward and grinds the heel of his boot into the rotted wooden planks. "Nobody worth it."

"Steve would care," Bucky says, not agreeing nor disagreeing, just… stating.

"Maybe," Tony replies. "But just as Howard's son."

And that means that he still doesn't see Tony beyond Howard, and Bucky just doesn't _understand._ How can Steve, who was always so bitter that women couldn't see the heart behind the small frame, how can he stand opposite Tony and ask him to prove better than Howard? How _dare he?_

"I'll send a postcard," Tony says, dully, _tiredly._ "Maybe some pretty blue ones from Maui, eh? Throw him off the tail?"

Bucky grimaces, inhales and exhales, smoke hazing the world around him. He can't die from cancer, the choking burn of the smoke feels good on his skin, and the grey doesn't hurt his eyes. There's a reason he hates alcohol, now, and another one as to why he likes cigarettes.

 _(Why are you helping me?)_

 _(Because I know revenge.)_

He tilts his head to the side and drops the topic, Tony's duplicity already forgiven. There are some marks to carry forever, and others to let go- too many of one or too little of the other only results in war and death and famine, especially to those who can bend the world to their will. And, indeed, there are other things he wants to talk about- he _needs_ to talk about- and Tony won't exactly broach the topic, either. "I want to kill Hydra."

Tony pauses, goes over his words, and folds his arms, leaning against the wall carefully. "You can't," he refutes, a devil's advocate in burnished gold armor.

 _(Cut off one head, two grows in its place.)_

"Then I will be Hercules," Bucky replies, colorless eyes meeting Tony's, not the cold of Winter, but the sheer emptiness of a man who doesn't know his future or his past, and isn't utterly sure of the present, either. "And I will not just bathe my hands in their blood, but burn it to the ground.

"Will you stop me?"

Tony swallows, hard, and his eyes dip away. It is one thing, Bucky knows, to stand in Malibu and say that he will help Bucky seek his vengeance- it is another thing altogether for him to stand aside and watch Bucky raze those he terms his enemies to the ground.

But Tony is also a man of his word, and he has also taken his debts in blood- in Gulmira, in his Expo, even from Loki.

He knows blood intimately.

 _(Tony knows nightmares, too.)_

"I'm not happy about it," Tony says, finally, voice taut and jaw clenched. "But I'll be there. You deserve that much."

 _Lie._

Bucky bites down on the cigarette butt, lets the ash fall at the abrupt movement, and spits out the rest of the husk. Then he spins around, lets the shadows drip away from his chest-

 _(like the Soldier, bleeding black blood and memories as he dies)_

-and pins Tony down with a sharp glare.

"You're not here for me."

And, hard and quiet and more plea than order- " _Don't lie to me."_

Tony sighs, rubs a hand over his arm, toys with the metal bracelet on his wrist.

"The Ten Rings was an offshoot of Hydra's," he begins, looking for all the world as if he intends to finish.

But maybe there's something in the sky, maybe there's still a darkness in his soul, maybe Bucky's pushed too hard, too fast. It doesn't really matter, though, the reason- Tony still bites off a curse that stings in the early morning chill, and spins away, stalking into the house.

Bucky wants to sigh, in annoyance or irritation, but he doesn't, just scrubs a hand roughly through his hair. Then he looks outward, over the crumbling porch and into the wooded clearing Tony had driven them to last night.

The day is going to be a cool one, he can tell; if he closes his eyes and concentrates, he can smell the faint hint of honeysuckle and grass, smoke from his fag, and underlying it all, the crisp scent of ice and morning and dawn.

 _Stop delaying._

He owes Tony.

There. That is the bare, austere truth- complete in its entirety, terrifying in its implications.

He owes Tony- a debt that transcends life, death, and even the great Ever After.

The smooth curve of his metal arm glitters in the watery light, just as colorless as any other shade in this small hovel, looking just as innocent as a daisy, not as if he has killed a thousand and one men with this… _killing machine._

He owes Tony.

And for every conversation they've had, it's been Tony who stretches out, who tries to bridge the gap, who moves further over the gaping canyon, and tries to beckon Bucky closer. Bucky owes him, owes him for his silence and his support, owes him enough that he can brave that first, terrifying step across the chasm.

He owes Tony.

But he's also selfish- always was and always will be. So he remains outside for now, instead of going inside; breathes in and out, in and out, filling his lungs with crisp air and frozen smoke-

 _(liquid courage)_

-and closes his eyes, plunges headfirst into his memories. He owes Tony-

 _(because I had to pay my debts in blood, receive my debts with my own hands)_

-and if he can feel whole with this revenge, he'll be damned if he runs away before he finishes.

* * *

When he steps inside, Tony is hunched over the fire, a fire that he must have coaxed into being. His eyes are distant, his face blank, his usual dynamic personality dimmed to a flickering candle instead of a blazing bonfire.

"I killed SHIELD," Bucky says, roughly.

So many deaths for that, on his and Natalya's hands, blood of innocents and blood of the guilty, a greater sacrifice to buy them some time before the next head popped out of the sand. The first cost had been Steve, and he'd bought them seventy years; the second was Bucky, and the third was SHIELD.

 _(We are Hydra. We are SHIELD. We are the Avengers. And if it comes to it… we can and will play God.)_

 _(Do not stand in our way.)_

Tony doesn't move.

 _(Too much? Too little?)_

 _(The price-)_

 _(The price-)_

 _(The price-)_

 _(The price of failure is not to be seen, is not something they can afford to consider)_

Bucky shifts a hand, the bare flesh now pressed against the wooden floor. "I was caught by the Nazis, once. Before… before the Fall."

At that, the muscles in Tony's neck tighten convulsively, a choked sob- a tortured scream- that will never see day.

"That, in many ways, was even worse than being caught by Hydra," Bucky says, carefully, traversing this mine-laced battlefield with absolute caution. "They didn't see me as anything more than an animal to be whipped and killed, when I lost my value, as a worker."

He hasn't spoken to others about this, this first brush with death and the life-after that comes, not even Steve. First, it was because he couldn't, not without sacrificing his pride and masculinity, and then it was because it was _war._ There wasn't any time, not without seeming selfish, and that was something Bucky'd always taken pains not to become, not if he had a choice.

But, then again, recently he hasn't been anything other than selfish, to Tony, Steve, and even himself.

 _(Don't even talk about Natalya.)_

And then there was Hydra.

"I was waiting to die, the whole time."

Some measure of color returns to Tony's face, and with it, his ability to raise his masks- though his effort is pitiable, the ease with which he does it speaks of long practice, and Bucky just can't comprehend what might have caused this man to be so…

Pitiable. There isn't another word for it.

"A lot of the time, my missions were in the cold. I was taken by Russians- they _enjoy_ winter. But… I remember one time, when I was in the heat- I remember sand, actually, and sun, maybe cliffs… It was just another mission."

He remembers more, though- remembers Natalya and bitter hatred, the weight of the silencer on his gun, the weave of the muzzle over his jaw, the exact recoil as he shot her and paid his debts of love and hate in one movement: he didn't kill Natalya for a half-remembered memory, just finished his mission.

 _(Love is for children.)_

"Steve saved me," Bucky continues, "both times. Granted, the second was a little late- but he thought I was dead, so…"

Tony's eyes shift upwards, meet his, and the depths of loss in them can only be matched by Bucky's own.

"He let you go," Tony breathes, as if he knows this to be a mortal blow- but a blow that he will strike nonetheless. "He _let go."_

And, to the broken little heir of Howard and his weapon's empire, there is nothing more unforgivable, nothing less understandable, than a man who gives up on another.

 _(Always a way out…)_

 _(You think I haven't crawled?)_

Bucky swallows, hard, his precarious balance nearly tipped into the black abscess of his memories.

Then he squares his shoulders and meets Tony's heavy gaze. Only one of them is allowed to be broken at a time, so at least one of them can support the weight of this conversation.

But, before he can say anything, Tony bites out, "He never searched."

"He thought I was dead," Bucky retorts, keeping his voice calm, his words even, with an effort. "He let go- because he couldn't hold on. If he had… only thing that would've happened would have been that we both died."

"And Captain America can't be a sacrifice," Tony whispers, bitter and acrid, each word stinging. "Not like the rest of us."

"…you were the one who flew the nuke," Bucky replies, sharp, furious, at both the implications and the reality. "Who…"

"Fury," Tony says, "so it's a damn good thing you killed him. Or I would have."

Bucky only nods.

 _(When the time comes for Tony to kill his demons… Bucky will stand at his back.)_

"There's a cell two miles from here," Tony says abruptly, too abruptly.

Bucky should lean forward, wrap a hand around Tony's shoulder, let him exorcise his nightmares with words and something less destructive than what he wants. He should do what Tony did for him- be there, be what Tony needs.

But Bucky is selfish at heart, and merciless, and he has the Soldier's black blood staining his mind.

So, he says: "How quick can you suit up?"

* * *

The Hydra facility is not really large- just a small one, made for a grassroots team that will snake information up through the chain to whatever king sits at the top of Hydra.

It used to be Red Skull.

Now, nobody knows who it is.

Bucky and Tony move silently, Bucky quiet by nature- though, maybe not his own; the Soldier might be dead, but his ghost tends to haunt him- and Tony by necessity.

 _(Torture is not kind to those who are strong.)_

There are guns and knives strapped across his body, grenades and even fake lives, if this proves to be a mistake. Tony is nothing if not paranoid- with reason- so, if they are to be separated, all it will take is for them to reach the nearest city and slip into a hotel. Nobody will ever think twice, not with the hundreds of contingencies laid in place.

"Split up?" He asks, voiceless.

Tony smirks- or, at least, Bucky thinks he does, because he cocks his hip at just an angle too wide, his neck tilts back by perhaps two degrees. In a week of interaction, he knows some of Tony's tells.

That feels _good._

"I'm hurt, honey. Divorce ain't ordained by the Church, ya know. What would your proper Catholic mommy say?"

And, ladies and gentlemen, Tony Stark is _back._ With a vengeance.

Bucky misses the old, brooding one already.

Except- he isn't Steve, to rage and get flustered at Tony's deliberate provocations; he isn't Natalya, to ignore him with glacial contempt; he isn't Banner or Barton, who would ignore him- out of indifference and embarrassment, respectively; he also isn't Thor, to not understand most of Tony's references.

His lip kicks upward in a devilish smirk, as he says, "It's your momma who's the Irish Catholic, Stark. So… let's use your pop's weapons to kill 'em all, and then we can use my dada's funeral service to give 'em burials, yeah?"

There's a beat of stunned silence- long enough for him to think he's gone too far.

But then Tony lets out a sharp bark of laughter, and swoops upwards, an angel in gold and scarlet, his armor glowing silver under the stars.

"Remind me to change my will, Barnes." Then, voice still gleeful, "Catch me if you can, you bastards!"

Bucky just laughs, and leaps into the spinning vortex of death Tony is weaving around him.

Slowly, the Winter Soldier begins to thaw.

* * *

There are only seven people inside the base, and none of them are dangerous enough to merit a true blip on either of their radars. Jarvis still monitors them, though- Tony knows better than anyone the cost of permitting prisoners their freedom.

If they aren't given it… they'll take it. Fight for it.

 _(Kill for it.)_

Bucky and Tony blaze in, and as Bucky faces off against the _idiots_ across from him- they're young, and inexperienced, and it's just their bad luck to be fighting against _him-_ Tony rushes into the control room.

It's quick and clean, the boy doesn't have any weapons and Bucky has too many.

It almost ruins the thrill of the kill.

Nevertheless, this boy is _Hydra,_ with all the darkness that that entails, so Bucky doesn't hesitate to attack with all his strength, metal arm dominant over his flesh one.

The corrugated metal of the walls punctures, crumpling in on itself at their fight.

Bucky's eyes narrow.

The boy is quicker than he'd imagined, lithe and flexible. But that same flexibility means that his strength is lessened, a sacrifice of strength for speed, muscle for agility. Like-

 _(Natalya.)_

Like… like others.

And he killed them all.

This boy is no different- will be no different.

The brown hair flops over his forehead, shading his eyes, narrowed as they are in concentration. But Bucky also has the super soldier serum in his veins, a cocktail that might not be as effective as Steve's… but it didn't need to be. He'd already been blessed with a strong body, years before the war.

Bucky darts forward, a blur of silver and steel and death, and catches the boy by the throat, holds him up, slightly, and feels the syrupy swallow of fear across his neck, the delicacy of bone and cartilage and skin throbbing just under his hands.

Bucky leans into his face, and wonders if the boy sees death in Bucky's eyes.

There's certainly fear there.

"Hydra killed me," he says, almost an apology, but it isn't. Because he'll kill and burn and raze the world to the ground if he has to, if he thinks Hydra is still alive, if his vengeance isn't buried.

But Bucky's not a sadist, either, and he pays for his sins, too, not just his debts.

So he doesn't kill the boy with impersonal metal, but feels every snap of the bones in his neck under his flesh arm. It's a moment's work, and finished: a life ended, a new one begun.

As he strides into the control center, it's to see Tony bark out laughter, and it's laced with shards of diamond, under the exterior of iron.

"What is it?" He asks, pulling out a gun.

Likely, it isn't an enemy he can fight against, not if Tony is hunched over the computer like that- but the weight of the gun feels natural and good in his hands, a protection as much as a provocation.

"No danger," Tony replies, and sends a glass monitor flying across the room. "Not to us."

"Tony-"

"We called it Hydra," he says, eyes lifting up to meet Bucky's. "But it wasn't just the monster, Barnes. It was _so much more…"_

"…what?"

"An acronym. Of names. And guess who isn't alone on there?"

No way. No _frigging way._ It couldn't be like this, couldn't be this bad. Hydra couldn't have kept the secret for this long, not without people _realizing-_

Of course they could have done it.

They fooled SHIELD.

 _Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?_

 _Who watches the watchers?_

Damn them all.

"Who?" He asks, voice scraping out of his throat.

"Alexander _fucking_ Pierce," Tony hisses.

But Pierce was only the sacrificial lamb, sent out as a decoy. There are puppeteers behind this, men and women without names and without faces…

If there is one man in the world who can find them, it's Tony Stark, inheritor of his father's weapons. Heir to his throne- and owner of his legacy.

"Tony," Bucky says, stepping forward, flesh hand clasping over Tony's shoulder. " _Who?"_

"Yadira Kholi, Dmitri Dreykov, Raina Svartalsdottir, Alexander Pierce," and here, Tony hesitates, forehead creasing, but one look at Bucky's face tells him that there is no shitting around about this, not one bit, "and Heinrich… Zola."

The sons and daughters of their parents' legacies, as Tony is to Howard's. Bucky's lips thin, hatred a bubbling pot inside of him that will explode soon enough.

"We can kill them," he says, but his voice is dead, and even he can't bring himself to believe his words.

Tony shakes his head, still watching him carefully.

" _We_ can't."

Bucky's head snaps up at the disguised note of wary hope in his voice. "Tony-"

"We can't, Bucky. But the _Avengers…"_

 _(The price of failure, Bucky Barnes. You want your revenge, come._

 _Take it._

 _But be prepared to weep tears of blood, on the road, and be prepared to pay the consequences.)_

"…we can."

* * *

"Not Natalya," Bucky argues, on the way out of the base. "And not Steve. The others…"

Tony sighs. "There were only six of us, Barnes. Not one person more, and we started out as less. If you don't want Romanoff, then you won't get Barton, which leaves Bruce and Thor. Thor's off-world, and even if he did come back in time, he responds best to Steve, whom you don't want. Bruce might come- but it's more likely that he won't, not without backing from some other… people."

"Then _we_ fight!" Bucky bites out, rage twisting with grief to form a maelstrom of rage. "We can do it, Tony, we _can!_ We don't need-"

He breaks it off, knowing the lie that will come out if he continues. The truth is, they _do_ need the Avengers, to destroy Hydra once and for all.

And while it isn't Bucky's responsibility, it is sure as all _hell_ his desire.

 _(I could have torn the world apart… but you would have done so much worse.)_

A light hand on the back of his neck- the first human touch he's felt in over seventy years meant solely for comfort- startles him. Tony stands there, right next to him, not draped in armor, but radiating normal, human _heat._

He wonders how much courage it took him to touch Bucky.

But Tony doesn't seem to notice the self-loathing there, or maybe he does, and is just kind enough to ignore it. Whatever the reason, he presses down, slightly, on the back of his neck, before skimming down his arm and grasping his metal wrist.

Bucky's confused.

Then, slowly, Tony lifts his arm, higher and higher, until he has to arch his shoulder slightly to go with the flow.

And-

And-

And-

Tony, foolish idiot, narcissistic, self-sacrificing, _idiotic_ excuse for a-

Heir to Howard-

Broken child-

He presses Bucky's hand to his Adam's apple, where it bobs in defiance of his actions, a counterpoint of fear where this has all been about trust.

 _(A boy's brown hair, his pale eyes, wide in fear and loss, and Bucky doesn't give.)_

 _(Flesh and cartilage and bone, breaking under his flesh and metal and_ desire.)

"I know there's a part of you that wants to kill me," Tony says steadily, as if he hasn't just given Bucky _carte blanche,_ as if hasn't just signed a blank check. "But I also know that you won't."

"And if I want to?" Bucky asks, because he never could resist being the devil, couldn't resist raising Tony just a little bit, seeing the fear dilate his pupils while the rest of his face goes blank-

 _(Steve, on the helicarrier, beaten and bruised and bent in half, tugged so thin between loyalties of the past and oaths of today, but never,_ never _broken)_

-"Do you?" Tony retorts, recovered. "Romanoff did. Barton did. Once upon a time. They worked out how to move past it."

He drops Tony and whirls away, metal arm punching the metal wall in a clang of metal on metal. "I'm not them," he says lowly.

But Tony doesn't drop it. "I've seen the videos, you know. Romanoff calls it red in her ledger. You think she doesn't have it, Barnes? You think I don't? That Rogers, Barton, Bruce- none of us do? What, do you think real heroes have any sort of marking on them from _birth?"_

"You can't wipe out a century of red!" Bucky shouts, finally, pushed one step too far, too fast. "You _can't,_ Tony, so don't you dare try!"

"Of course you can't," Tony shouts right back, face flushing, "of course you can't, Bucky, you can't if you never _try!"_

"I ran away!" Bucky screams, bellows, this final push the last one before he falls off the cliff. There's only so much pain he can take- and the cost has become too much, for this one secret. "I ran away," he continues, quieter, "earlier. Got as far as New York. Saw Howard- at an… an Expo. And he stood up there, and in three sentences he managed to objectify what Steve did, take his ultimate sacrifice and say anyone would do it."

There's a shadow of horror in Tony's expression, but he pushes past it, and breathes out, sharply. "What did he say?"

"No." He turns around, and lets the bleakness show. "I'm not telling you. Look it up, if you want. But… after that, I didn't want to stay. I returned. To Hydra. I _let_ them erase my memories, To- Stark. So don't call me good. Natalya ran when she had the chance. I… didn't. And that makes all the difference."

"Natasha ran," Tony agrees quietly. "But she ran _to_ something. You just ran away. And _that,_ Bucky-" he pauses, here, and waits until Bucky meets his gaze. It's compassionate, a little worn, but above all, understanding. "-that makes all the difference."

There's a rumble from the jet, and Tony glances at it. "I haven't told anyone what's going on, yet. If you want I can drop you off, and-"

There is a tide in the affairs of men, and this is the flood. Bucky wants nothing more than to run and hide, hide from his past- but…

This is the flood.

This is the flood, and there is nowhere to run anymore, not when he can still claim not to be a coward. He ran before, yes, but that was when the Soldier still owned his body. He cannot run now, not with memories of Steve and Natalya and Howard-

 _(and, yes, of course, Tony)_

-running about his head, melting ghosts of his past with specters of his present with memories of his future.

Which, you know, doesn't make any sense at all.

His mind appears to be the first casualty.

"Who's going to be there?" Bucky asks, bile dripping from his teeth, venomous as any cobra.

Tony leans away, eyes shrewd and assessing. "Cap. Barton. I don't know about Romanoff."

Bucky struggles for a moment with that weight, but then relaxes. This is the hard part- the rest will be easier, hopefully. And Steve will balance out Natalya's dislike, Barton will balance the others' emotions.

"You called her She-bitch, Stark," he says dryly. "Just… three days ago."

"I'm irritating," Tony replies absently, shifting the controls on the plane and swanning it closer to the glass building in front of them. "Not suicidal. Just… getting in practice."

He should hate him, Bucky thinks, should hate Tony for calling him out on his lies, should be insulted that he can no longer live so clearly in denial.

 _(You would make the world bleed.)_

He owes Tony.

And, when all is said and done, he feels better now- with the lies dispensed of. It's one less weight to tie on his neck, one less sin to wash his hands of, a little less in his ledger dripping red.

Bucky Barnes squares his shoulders as the doors of the quinjet hiss open into the soft-lit room outside, and without so much as a glance over his shoulder, he walks outside-

 _(No mercy. Not to those who don't deserve it.)_

-and smiles softly at Steve, standing just to the left of the ramp.

"Hey, Stevie. Long time no see, huh?"

* * *

 **Here's Part 2! The third part will encompass a little bit more torture and/or gore; this one remained primarily Tony and Bucky. I was so happy with the responses to the last fic... I'm glad you guys liked it! I'll be dropping off the world for a couple days, so don't expect any responses, but I just had to update after some people were so kind.**

 **(And, you know, sorry for the Caelia 2 update fiasco. Just realized that, instead of clicking on the second chapter, I clicked on the first. I'm sleep deprived, people, running on three hours, and need a little more rest before I'm anywhere _close_ to coherent. Just saying- don't go for Master's programs in South California. Just plain don't.)**

 **See ya next time!**

 **Reviews inspire me.**

 **-Dialux**


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